The industry was in trouble. Although vital to the global economy, a chronic lack of investment in innovation had reduced productivity, leading to increased costs and subpar returns on capital. At the same time, legacy environmental, health and safety issues had eroded mining's social license to operate in many communities. To turn things around would require changing the paradigm: to recast the mining business model as a development partnership, working with stakeholders rather than at odds with them to pursue shared goals of prosperity.

Following the meeting in Brazil, a smaller working group representing the same range of diversity worked for 18 months to create theDevelopment Partner Framework, which was presented at the Ford Foundation in December 2014. The Framework details best practices for collaboration between the industry and stakeholders and is anchored by three pillars:

Shared purpose

Thriving ecosystems

Competitive companies, communities and countries

The Brazil meeting also initiated a groundbreaking dialogue with the Vatican. The Catholic church is deeply involved in mining communities around the world, but there had never been a direct conversation with the senior leaders of the mining industry. Initial conversations developed into a series of Days of Reflection held at the Vatican. That, in turn, led to similar dialogues with leaders of the Church of England, the Methodist Church and other faith-based organizations, helping to bridge the divide between industry and other stakeholders. These kinds of dialogues are now happening all over the world independent of the KIN Catalyst. The KIN Catalyst process is a journey designed to embrace such serendipitous developments.

​Indigenous peoples, including the First Nations of Canada, have found value in the Framework, using the template to start dialogues of their own.

Our efforts have been recognized with a silver medal from the prestigious Edison Awards.

We look forward to the work started by the KIN Catalyst for the Mining Company of the Future being more broadly adopted over the next few years, becoming the industry standard. ​